Love of the Land

For the week ending 5 March 2005 / 24 Adar I 5765

Anniversary of a Modern Legend

by Rabbi Mendel Weinbach zt'l
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Most legends connected with Eretz Yisrael go back centuries or even millennia. But there are modern legends as well.

One of them is about a young Jerusalem yeshiva student who is a volunteer paramedic with Magen David Adom. Exactly two years ago, on Saturday night, March 9, 2002, Yishai found himself together with friends near the Moment Cafe in the Rechavia neighborhood of the capital. The powerful explosion which rocked the cafe and claimed many victims alarmed him to action. Although this was after Shabbat and he had no equipment with him and he was detached from the crew he usually worked with, Yishai felt an urgent need to do whatever he could to help. Arriving at the scene of the bombing before the ambulances, he saw a woman with blood gushing from her leg. Without his usual tourniquet that he carries with him on weekdays, he ripped off his white shirt and removed his tzitzit garment which he tied around the wound. Minutes later the ambulance arrived and took the wounded woman to the hospital where the operating surgeon said that Yishais quick thinking and action saved her life.

When Yishai and his bride Aderet celebrated their wedding recently, they received a Mazel Tov from afar from the woman he had saved. After a long and painful convalescence she has fulfilled her dream of studying in England, having won a competition for a prestigious scholarship.

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